3.1 Logging on to a
Terminal AccountNow that you have an
account at VSNL, have your modem connected, and have the software
configured, you are ready to log on to the VSNL's Terminal
account.

In the dialing directory of your communication software, e.g.
Procomm Plus for DOS, Telix for DOS (a shareware program) or
Procomm for Windows, enter the dial-up telephone numbers for
VSNL's Terminal account service. For Mumbai, these numbers
currently are 265-9045, 264-1520, and 431-5836, but they are
subject to change as notified by VSNL, from time to time. For
each number enter the terminal emulation, data bits, stop bits
and parity. Usually a menu, e.g. the Revise command in Procomm
Plus for DOS in the dialing directory, will walk you through
these steps.

In your dialing directory, highlight (select) VSNL's number and
dial out by pressing the <enter> key. You will hear the
modem sending tones or pulses.

When your modem connects to VSNL's modem, you will hear squealing
noises coming out of the modem's speaker as they establish
contact and exchange protocols. Now you are connected to VSNL.
The first screen welcoming you to VSNL, as shown in Fig 3-1, will
be displayed on your monitor:

Your cursor is at the login
prompt. Type in your userid given to you by VSNL, and press
<enter>. Then you will come to the Password prompt. Type in
the password given to you by VSNL, press <enter>, and you
will see a welcoming screen by VSNL. You are now logged on to
your account at VSNL. The screen which appears on your monitor is
as follows:

Fig. 3-2 The
second screen you will see when you logon to VSNL's Terminal
account

Now you are ready to do some
useful work with you account. First of all let me explain the
first two items of the First Menu shown in figure 3-4 above.
Selection "H" (i.e. Help) gives list of UNIX commands
that are available to you from the UNIX prompt and they are
discussed in detail in chapter 13. Selection "0"
("zero") logs you out of the your account and is
explained in the next section.

You are very strongly advised to change your password, to
something different from the one given to you by VSNL -- to one
of your own picking. How to do this is explained in Chapter 10.3.2 Logging out of
a Terminal AccountIt may be necessary for
you to stop your work on the computer at any time. For this
purpose, it is advisable to get out of the account and log off in
an orderly manner. If the electrical power is accidentally
disconnected or you just turn off the power to your equipment,
several emergency shut-down systems in your software, hardware,
and at VSNL's server will shut things down and log you out, but
there is a small chance of losing some data. As a routine
procedure, you should log out through the software.

To log out, select item "0" and this will log you out.
Alternatively you could select item "10" on the First
Menu and you will come to the UNIX prompt which will be your
userid followed by ">". Since my userid is rajm, I
would get the following prompt:

rajm>

Type "exit" and press <enter>, and this logs you
off the account. Something similar to what is shown in Fig. 3-5
will be displayed on your screen.

Fig. 3-5 Logout
messages on your screen

Local -418-
Logged out port 12

Local -010- Session 1 to TELNET on node name 202.54.1.18
established

Digital UNIX (giasbm01.vsnl.net.in) (ttyse)

login:NO CARRIER

You can now close down the
application programs you are using on your computer and shut it
off as instructed by your software.

3.3
Logging on to TCP/IP AccountTCP/IP stack would have to be installed in windows for you to
access the account. Appendix B gives details about installation
of the TCP/IP stack for windows 3.1/3.11 and for windows 95. As a
part of this installation, a telephone dialer will be
automatically installed. Since Windows95 has become a popular
operating system, following discussion will be in its context.
However, whatever discussed will apply to other TCP/IP stacks and
very similar procedure to login to the account will have to be
followed.

For Windows95 you should bring the icon for the dialer (e.g.
shortcut to VSNL), which is configured for VSNL available on the
desktop, as it will make it easier to start the dialing. After
you click on the icon the dialer window will appear on your
screen and clicking on connect will start the dialing
process via your modem. After connection is made, a Post-Dial
Terminal Screen will show up, which will require your username
and Password as shown in following Fig.3-6.

After you have supplied username
(which in this case i4u@bom2, and the Password (which I am not
going to tell you). You will get a router prompt which in this
case happens to be:

gilbsb4.38>

At this prompt you will have to
type "ppp" and hit <Cr> or Enter. You will then
see information about the IP address which is dynamically
assigned to this session of TCP/IP and some other technical stuff
followed by junk characters.

Please note, that before you
proceed, you must see the junk characters as they
establish the necessary ppp portocol connection. At this point
you will have either press F7 or click on "Continue "
to proceed. The Post-Dialup Terminal screen will disappear and a
window will show uptitled "connecting to VSNL";
in which at first it will be attempting to verify your username
and password and then will inform you that you are logging on to
the Network. Then after it has logged on to the the Internet in
the window it will say, the window title will say "connected
to VSNL". You should minimize this window and now it will
appear on our taskbar of Windows95. Now you are connected to
Internet and in fact our computer is sitting on the Internet with
an IP address.

At this point you can start any of the TCP/IP applications e.g.
browser, an email client like Eudora or whichever large number of
applications which are been written for TCP/IP.

After you have finished your
session i.e. whatever you wanted to do and want to log out, you
need to maximize the window "Connected to VSNL" and
click on disconnect. Your modem at this point will drop the
carrier.

Suppose that you are you are
lucky enough to travel to different metros actually (rather than
traveling in cyberspace) and you want to check your email or do
surfing. You may think that you have to connect to your account
via an STD call! But there is an easier and inexpensive way to
using your accounts.

VSNL has provided this facility to log on to your shell account
as well as use your TCP/IP account from any city with either VSNL
or DOT server for Internet.

Procedure is very simple. In a given city, in this case since
we are in Mumbai, you dial in to any of the Shell or Terminal
Account numbers and you will get the screen shown in Fig. 3-7.

Fig. 3-7 Logging
on to the shell account from different city.

1. Logon to
giasbm01
2. Logon to giasbm02
3. Logon to bom3
4. Exit

Selection:
1

Trying
202.54.1.18 ... Open

Digital UNIX
(giasbm01.vsnl.net.in) (ttyt8)

login: guest
Password: (Password to key in is: gias123.
This will not be displayed on the screen)

At the login: prompt enter
"guest" and at the Password: prompt enter
"gias123". Then what you will in the final screen is
shown in Fig. 3-8. The top part would have rush past and you will
see only the menu in the end asking you to choose the server in
the city where your account is issued.

Once you have selected the city to
log on to you are on the server on your home town and then you
can log on like you normally do and proceed with the work you
wish to accomplish. The Terminal account phone numbers in
different cities is given in Appendix
A

b.)
Roaming TCP/IP Dial-up FacilityVSNL has offered roaming TCP/IP dialup facility to give full
Internet access for customers who are moving from one GIAS/DOT
node to another. Customer needs to provide full e-mail address at
username: prompt as follows:

Username:sonia@giasbm01.vsnl.net.in

Password:xxxxxx

Authentication will be done at the
respective centre where the customer is registered.
The TCP/IP access numbers are given in Appendix
A

If you are one of the
lucky ones who is roaming around the world and want to check your
mail in on any VSNL server, you can do that. However, to be able
to do that you will have to have access to someones account
in the city you are visiting or you can go to, now becoming
popular, at least in the USA, the cyber cafes. The basic
requirement is that you have "telnet" access. Telnet is
a service on the Internet as we have discussed in Chapter 6. Most
of the time you have an UNIX prompt when you log on to
someones Shell account or you are directly on to the telnet
prompt. In case you are at the UNIX prompt you type,
"telnet" and you are now at "telnet" prompt.
At telnet prompt you type the address of your VSNL server. In the
following example we telneting to jaipur server:

telnet.> open jp1.vsnl.net.in

Once you are connected to this
machine, which is your VSNL server at home, you can use it on the
shell as if you are sitting at home on your computer.